Stars and the Moon
by Tytania Strange
Summary: In the town of Santa Cecelia, a ghost lives in a palace by the sea. The world of the opera house mixes with a modern world of faerie. The original idea was inspired by Tam Lin, my favorite fairytale.
1. For a ghost is there

People said that the van der Luyden mansion was haunted. The house sat on forty acres of beach front land that could have been divided into forty separate properties, each of which would have been worth a small fortune, but the owners didn't seem to know or care what it was worth. Every day, the post office delivered several hundred letters from hopeful real estate agents and new multi-millionaires, but none of them ever received a response to their inquiries. Music never drifted over the van der Luyden lawns in the summer and colored lights never twinkled in the tree during the winter. The only signs of life occurred every morning at eight, when the wrought iron gates swung open to admit ten employees onto the property, and every evening at five they opened again to allow them to leave. None of them ever had a word to say about their employer, if such a person existed but the local children did. When asked who lived on the van der Luyden estate, the little moppets confidently answered that it was "a ghost."

The children knew it was a ghost because it had a white face and it only came out a night. That was the textbook definition for a ghost. While the adults respectfully stayed away from the van der Luyden property, the children considered it their inalienable, ethical right to sneak onto the van der Luyden beach at every possible opportunity. The gardeners would shoo them off, if they caught them, but that was hardly a punishment to worry about. The owners, whoever they were, never so much as set foot on the sand to enjoy the sunny California days, so there was nothing to be concerned about as long as the sun was up.

After dark, most of the children had to be inside and in bed anyway, so there was no cause to fear the ghost. Of the brave few who braved parental displeasure, none were quite brave enough to face the ghost. If they saw it coming, they ran and hid in the rocks on the south side of the property, cautiously peeping out from time to time, to watch it wandering solemnly by the water's edge. They didn't dare get closer, because legend had it that the ghost drank blood. Once, they said, the ghost had yelled at a retreating pre-pubescent trespasser and they'd seen the stains of blood in his mouth. If you drank human blood, you could never get rid of the stains. Everyone knew that.

Lately, the ghost didn't yell, it only walked around for a while but it was better to be safe than sorry. The children never strayed too far from the safety of the rocks when the sun began to set. As for the adults, they said to stay off the property and leave that poor family in peace, which was funny because how can someone who has a mansion and servants and their very own beach be poor?

Had anyone ever dared to speak with the ghost, it could have told them all about the van der Luyden's, so that they could decide for themselves whether or not to pity them. It was a story that had been handed down through the family, usually told at bedtime, followed by a kiss on the forehead and a prayer. Supposedly, it had really and truly happened, but so long ago that it was easier to leave it in the nebulous days of once upon a time. It was the story of their ancestor, Jan, who was the very first van der Luyden and founded the family fortune and misfortune and in so doing, was the originator of every van der Luyden story thereafter.

Once upon a time, the kind of time when people still saw fairies in the woods, and little household gods still peeped in from time to time to see that hearth was being properly cared for, Jan was born into a poor family somewhere in Holland. He was blessed with piercing blue eyes and a ready smile, but cursed with bad luck that haunted every task he attempted. If he went into the forest to hunt, the game would be frightened away. If he plowed a field, the soil yielded no crops. If he milked a cow, that milk would be sour. Still, when he walked through the village, his eyes flashed and his smile melted every woman's heart, even if none would consider marrying a man so doomed to failure upon failure.

Jan lived with his mother and younger sisters in a hut made from twigs and mud. In the winter, they shivered and in the summer, they sweltered, sleeping on piles of straw with one blanket to be shared between them. Despite Jan's misfortunes, however, they had just enough to get by, until one spring when the months passed and the ground didn't thaw.

The other villagers said that the faerie queen was angry, and that it was she who blocked the sunlight and kept the plants from blooming. Some of them even cast hard glances at Jan, because he certainly seemed like the most likely person to anger the spirits, but he was more worried about watching his family starve and paid the villagers no mind.

At last, on the May night when it was said that the faeries held their midnight revels, Jan made up his mind. He would go into the woods in search of game, and he wouldn't return until he found it. If that meant that he never returned at all, then so be it. He would be one less mouth to feed at home, and his family would be spared his ill fortune. Despite their suspicions, the villagers tried to dissuade him but he was adamant. His mother wept as he gathered his bow and quiver, but knew that he was not to be dissuaded. He kissed his mother and sisters goodbye, then threw a green cloak over his shoulders and walked away into the forest.

The night was unusually cold and unusually quiet. As the sun began to set, Jan could barely see the leaves on the trees through the mist and shadows. As he wandered vainly through the woods, he wondered if it wouldn't be better to lay down someplace to quietly die, but his family was starving, and he couldn't give up until he had no more strength left to move. He kept his bow at the ready and wandered deeper and deeper into the silent forest.

At long last, Jan caught sight of something shimmering white in the distance, moving between the dark trees. It was only a few minutes before midnight and the moon cast its glow on the misty forest floor. At first, he thought that it was only another trail of mist in the moonlight, but as he crept closer, the white figure resolved itself in the form of a white doe. It seemed a shame to kill something so pretty as that, but it couldn't be helped. Jan raised his bow, but just as he let his arrow fly, there was a great clattering behind him, and the doe disappeared into the mist.

For a moment, Jan stood transfixed, gazing into the distance where his arrow was stuck harmlessly into a tree in the exact spot where the doe had once stood. Behind him, the Unseelie court was closing in. He could hear the sounds of their horses, the cries of the hunters and the howling of their black dogs, but when he looked, there was nothing but menacing shadows on the trees. The voices grew closer, so close that he could feel the heat of their breath and the swish of air across his cheeks as they rushed by, but still he saw nothing but shadows upon shadows, rushing between the trees. Then _she_ appeared.

The Faerie Queen was as pale and cold and beautiful as death. Her eyes glimmered black as coals in the moonlight and her dress was sewn from darkness itself. Her lips were ruddy and parted, revealing perfect white teeth with an oddly predatory gleam. Silver-gilt hair rippled over her white shoulders and she gently brushed it away with long, slender fingers. She gazed at Jan's lovely blue eyes and his gentle mouth and at last she smiled and said, "You have ruined our sport for the night and so must pay the price."

Jan thought that the Faerie Queen meant to kill him, but instead she took his face in her icy hands and pressed her burning red mouth to his. He trembled in her embrace, but succumbed none the less, parting his lips and allowing her to draw him down onto a bed of grass and leaves on the forest floor. His skin ached with the coldness of her, and yet he could not bear to resist her embrace. She pushed him onto his back and took her pleasure like an animal, crying out in triumph as he groaned under her. When her passion was spent, she once again laid her hands against his cheeks and looked into his wondering eyes.

"Once every generation, my kind must pay our debt to Hell in blood. I had meant that blood to be yours, but I have loved you and am loathe to give you up. Nevertheless, if you remain here with me, you will only sicken and die for our food is not mortal nourishment. Instead, I'll offer you a bargain. I will remove the curse that has haunted you, moreover, I will grant prosperity, and every possible gift and accomplishment both to you and your descendants. I only ask that one son of each generation be given to me, so that I might keep a part of you throughout the years."

Jan had little choice but to agree, before he slipped into a deep sleep that lasted the rest of the night. In the morning, when he awoke, the forest was full of game and every arrow that he let fly, struck its target. He returned home laden with more food than his family could eat, much to their great astonishment and joy. From that day on, Jan's bad luck was turned on its head. Everything he touched thrived. His sisters made good marriages and he gave them generous dowries. When a wealthy merchant passed through town, his daughter's eye lit on Jan and within a twinkling they were married and living in a great city. When the city was attacked by raiders, Jan proved himself so valiant that he was given a title and so he moved from a simple hut to a house to a castle.

There was only one blight on Jan's happiness and that was his third son. The child had been born just as the others, with his father's perfect blue eyes, but something was terribly wrong. The child was the cleverest of them and made the most wonderful and cunning things with his hands, but it was hardly compensation for his flesh that blistered and burned until it seemed to be rotting off of his bones even as he still lived. Sometimes, he fell into periods of melancholy and wept for no reason, while at others he would sit very still, listening intently to voices no one else could hear. Jan's wife could think of no reason for it, nor could the doctor, but Jan knew what the explanation had to be. He had promised one of his sons to the Faerie Queen and she had chosen the best of them for her own. The boy died, writhing on the floor and screaming as though he was being stabbed by a hundred unseen daggers, as Jan watched the shadows flickering on the wall and remembered the unseen riders on that long ago May night.

Time passed, and Jan's remaining children thrived, prospered, married and had children of their own. They built on the family fortune, as if everything they touched was blessed, and indeed it was until Jan's eldest son had a child who sang with the voice of an angel, even as the scarring pulled his skin so tight that his face became a grinning skull without a nose to speak of. That boy, too, died in agony, clutching his abdomen and crying that he could feel knives cutting him up from the inside.

At long last, touched by his children's grief, Jan shared the story of his night in the forest and his children in turn passed the tale along to their children. They consulted wise woman and clergymen and prayed to gods both large and small, but to no avail. No one knew how to break the curse. Years passed, and they turned to doctors, who swore they had never seen anything quite like the van der Luyden illness but searched for a cure nonetheless. In time, they learned how the curse could be managed, if never lifted.

Being a cursed family, the van der Luydens kept out of the public eye. They retreated to their cold palaces and silent estates. Their names were never listed among the most wealthy and influential people, even if they technically were. Their daughters never dated movie stars or danced naked on the bar at clubs. Their sons didn't drive drunk or attack pretty coeds at parties. There were people who knew of the van der Luydens, who had seen them moving unobtrusively amongst the placid idle rich, or accepted their generous donations to the arts and sciences, but no one really saw much of them and as time passed, they seemed to fade away. They had fewer sons and their daughters married away until at long last, the entire fortune was left in the hands of the present Mr. Erik van der Luyden who may or may not have been in the habit of taking moonlight walks on the beach.


	2. Goblin Fruits

The modern world has little use for faeries and their kin. What might have looked like a changeling in a less enlightened time is now merely a man suffering from a hereditary blood disease. A disease, however unusual, however rare, however resistant to treatment is still only a disease and nothing to write home about, assuming that one writes letters at all in such an age as this one. Call it what you will, disease or curse, the end result was much the same. In the prepared speech that Nadir Khan gives to all new employees of the van der Luyden interests, he speaks of an "illness of the blood" and, since it may be true in more ways than one, let us leave it at that.

The van der Luyden mansion is dark as the very grave. The curtains remain drawn from just before the first hint of sunrise to just after the last pale ray of sunlight has left the sky. Nadir Khan makes certain of this, rising every morning long before the sun and retiring only when it is dark. He should be able to trust the servants, but should and can are not the same thing. So, twice each day, he wanders the whole of the mansion, checking every last curtain.

Outside the van der Luyden mansion, the seasons pass from spring to summer to fall, but inside it is forever winter. Cold air filters through the vents into the shadowed rooms, where even the best of electric lighting struggles to shed a dim, feeble glow in the oppressive darkness. The drapes were deep black velvet, the fixtures icy crystal and cold silver, the upholstery shades of lifeless charcoals and grey so that the overall effect was barren and dead. It was a luxurious palace of unfulfilled wants and thwarted desires ruled by a pale prince who grew more silent and withdrawn with every passing year.

Nadir had begun to wonder if his employer was a sane man slowly being driven mad or a mad man slowly plucking away at the last shreds of his ties to reality. How could one ever tell in such a house? He could feel his own warmth being slowly leeched away over every passing day spent in the chilly darkness. He knew that his underlings feared him, could barely look him in the eye, much in the same way that they immediately averted their gaze if Mr. van der Luyden happened to be passing nearby. He wondered if he had instructed them to do so, or if it was done on instinct- Mr. van der Luyden does not wish to be seen, so we shall not see him. It was an atmosphere of utter loneliness in a place that was filled with people at all hours of the day and night, whether it was the day staff answering the phones and doing the heavy cleaning or the night staff who lived on the estate and were entrusted with the privileged rooms- Mr. van der Luyden's personal office, Mr. van der Luyden's music room and Mr. van der Luyden's bedroom- which had to be cleaned and arranged at night because Mr. van der Luyden didn't go out during the day. Of course, in recent years, he rarely went out at night, becoming more and more a prisoner of his illness or his madness or of the creature that had cursed his family long ago, but modern people don't believe in such things.

September was the most difficult time of year. The summer days were far too warm, far too bright and far too long and by September there had been far too many of them. Nadir rarely had reason to go out of doors during the day, but if he did, the sharp summer light would assault his eyes, leaving him blinking and cringing while the close hot air made his senses reel. Even the day employees were worn down as summer drew to a close, and like Nadir, looked forward to the coming of autumn and softer days of fog and gentle grey skies. Officially, the new season would be celebrated at the end of the month, but even a late September evening meant waiting hours for the sunset, being prickled by old summer's dried grasses and harsh air. The true Autumn didn't begin until the Goblin Market returned in the final week of October.

Officially, there was no such thing as the Goblin Market, and because it operated entirely outside the influence of permits or licenses, even those who attended were known to deny its existence. It didn't have a website, the vendors didn't reserve their places and the entertainment was never booked in advance. People simply showed up in a particular place in the wooded hills to the northeast of town at the agreed upon time, which was always began on a Saturday and always ended on Halloween, so that some years the Goblin Market lasted only a day and others it would continue for an entire week. Such was the nature of the event, and no matter what the weather, fine or foul, they always came although how they had figured out the where and when, Nadir would never know. Nadir had discovered it by following Mr. van der Luyden, many years ago now, that very first year he had come to Santa Cecelia.

That year, the Goblin Market had begun early in the week. It wasn't unusual then for Mr. van der Luyden to go out for the night, but for him to slip away night after night seemed entirely out of character. The opera wasn't performing and the symphony was dark, so where was he going? Nadir was convinced that some troublesome devil had taken possession of his ear, egging him on to pry among the other servants until the driver at last confessed that he had been taking their employer into the woods somewhere, but he had no idea where he was going or why. Having ascertained the location, it was easy enough to request the rest of the day off- Mr. van der Luyden never refused such requests- and to drive out himself, parking a safe distance away and then laying in wait for the arrival of the black limousine with its tinted and covered windows.

More than once, Nadir was certain that he'd been spotted in the open forest and cursed himself for a fool but he pressed on nonetheless until he found himself in the midst of the market with his employer nowhere to be seen. It was laughable really, an upstanding professional man in a suit, threading his way between people who might not have been out of place at a Renaissance Faire or a rock music festival or perhaps one of those science fiction conventions and realizing that he was the one who didn't belong. A woman in brown velvet offered him an apple, which he nervously refused and a man with a painted face juggled anything the passing crowd could think to throw at him. Vendors in stalls proudly displayed hand-embroidered clothes, herbs in glass bottles and beeswax candles in a rainbow of colors in the yellowish glow of a hundred fairy lights and lanterns. Fortunetellers advertised with rudely painted signs outside, and plied their trade under makeshift tents made from their own shawls. There was a constant din of talking, shouting, laughing and music played on pipes or sung in languages Nadir did not understand. And then there was the food, oh the food! Bright oranges and fragrant lemons! Pomegranates with seeds that sparkled like rubies! Cider frothing in mugs and dandelion wine in bottles! Jams and jellies in ever color, even blue! Succulent meats served in pastry and fresh vegetables with bread! In short, it was a sensory cacophony of mismatched colors, clashing styles and discordant sound and that made it all the more intoxicating. Privately, Nadir knew that one day he would return alone to taste the markets fruits and to search among the mysterious potions for the answers that medicine could not provide.

The sound of drumming nearby woke Nadir from his revelry as the mismatched crowd began to move in the direction of a makeshift platform that functioned as a performing stage. There were at least four drummers, no, five and now six, four standing on the platform and two walking amongst the crowd carrying their instruments with one hand and striking them with the other, pounding in rhythm with the beat of the heart and working the crowd into a fever pitch. Just in the corner of his eye, Nadir glimpsed the solitary, still figure of Mr. van der Luyden, standing far off to one side in the shadow of the trees, beyond the reach of the lights, waiting. Then at last, there was a soprano voice, piping high over the relentless beat, singing in a language Nadir could not understand but Nadir understood everything.

As for her, well, Nadir had little interest in her. She was slender. She was pretty. Still, there were better figures on California's beaches and plenty of Hollywood hopefuls with prettier faces. It was her voice that set her apart from any other woman Nadir had seen, and as much as he wanted to deny it, he could not. When she sang, she was surpassingly beautiful and she knew it. This was no child with a talent, but an accomplished siren who understood the power she could hold over anyone who heard her. He never would have expected it of Christine Daaé, the dull little secretary who greeted him before each and every one of the board meetings at Mercy Hospital with the same hope that his commute had been pleasant and announcement that coffee and pastries were in the conference room should he wish to partake. Well, it probably made sense that even a fairy would need a sensible sort of job in the modern world.

She didn't perform in every number. The choir was the focus of the performance, with three soloists appearing from time to time either with the group or individually to vary the program. In addition to the Daaé creature, a girl with black curls played on the flute and the conductor who showed off the skill of his ensemble by picking up a violin and playing alongside the group who were so well rehearsed that they needed no direction. The accompaniment was spare, mostly percussion with occasional strings or harp, which served well enough for what it was. Most of the arrangements were good but one or two were in a completely different class, clearly written by a different hand, with a haunting quality that particularly suited Daaé's voice, and as she sang, she gazed off into the distance and Nadir wondered if she wasn't singing to someone specific. Then the music would grow boisterous again, with the choir fairly swaying in time. In the final number, Daaé hopped off the platform and skipped through the audience, encouraging them to clap along with the bouncy tune. The conductor lifted her back on the platform by the waist and embraced her in what Nadir believed to be called a "bear's hug" before they bowed and even at a distance, Nadir could see his employer's hands tighten into fists in his pockets, and the set of his shoulders growing tense.

Once a man knows a thing, he cannot un-know it. Such is the curse that falls upon the curious. Even worse, the answer to one question begets a series of other questions, and each one was increasingly difficult to answer. The next morning, as he enjoyed his breakfast in the van der Luyden kitchen, Nadir thought about the Goblin Market and remembered a line of verse "We must not buy their fruits…" then looked down at his plate. He had been eating winter's fruits for months already, and sure enough the winter already had a hold of him and it was too late to escape.

Nadir Khan never did, however, go back to the Goblin Market, but that's another story. For the moment, we must leave him walking through the dark hallways of a cold palace just before the dawn closing the curtains against the final assault of summer's sun before summer gives way to autumn. Well, he had never much liked summer even before he ate of winter's fruits.


	3. Favors and gifts

The wide eyes, fringed with sooty lashes glistened with crystalline tears. She choked back a sob, a delicate, trembling "Ah!" from a voice that had been trained to grace the stages of the finest opera houses in the world. She twisted a lock of long, flowing hair between her fingers and turned her lovely face away. "I can't do it. I can't bear to face the Persian," she said, her voice trembling.

Both desk and floor were littered with papers, annual reports that had been printed incorrectly the day before and had to be printed and collated all over again before the morning's hospital board meeting. In the excitement, the coffee and continental breakfast normally served to the board members had not been ordered. A desperate call to the franchised coffee bar downstairs and another to the cafeteria, both of which required the calling of several favors had remedied the situation to an extent. All that considered, things would have been less stressful had the conference room been booked, which it had not, and since it had not been booked, it had not been cleaned which meant a call to janitorial and more favors cashed in.

Most of the board would not notice that anything was amiss, but the Persian was not like the rest of the board. Mr. Khan noticed everything. Even worse, Mr. Khan represented Mercy Hospital's most generous donors- a group of foundations, all of which were known to have a new endless supply of money and extremely high standards. If the Persian was displeased, the hospital had a great deal to lose, as did the individual who offended him. Getting fired would be the least of one's problems with an enemy like that.

Christine Daaé sighed, "I will take care of this, Carly," she said, taking the stack of reports out of the girl's shaking hands. "Take a minute to calm down and you can go back to the phones."

"Omigod, you're the best Christine!" Carly's tears evaporated as quickly as they'd appeared, "I will totally get you comps for all my performances at the opera!" She chirped, as she just about skipped back to her desk.

Tickets to the Santa Cecelia Opera were the last thing Christine wanted, although she was somewhat grateful to its managers. When they hired Carly to be their new rising star, they saved Christine the trouble of having her fired. There were many words that could describe Carly, but "competent" was nowhere on that list. She might be able to sing beautifully, according to her own estimation, but she could not write a letter, proofread a document answer a phone or schedule an appointment to save her own life. It would have been less work to simply do her job rather than clearing up the misunderstandings and mistakes that were the hallmark of her performance. All the same, Christine didn't quite have the heart to fire her when she had already given notice that she was leaving in less than a month. Soon, she would be the Santa Cecelia Opera's problem and they were welcome to her.

"You're going to tell Whittaker to fire her, right?" Lisette Jammes hissed as she passed Christine in the hallway.

Christine shook her head, "If this was a movie, she'd be having an epiphany in her office right now and tomorrow she'd turn up with a new haircut which would automatically make her the perfect employee."

"Oh yeah, it's all about the hair," Lisette smiled, "that's why I got new bangs before the board exam."

"If only you'd known about the haircut thing before you did all that studying," Christine patted Lisette's shoulder with her free hand.

"Seriously, I don't know what I was thinking," Lisette rolled her eyes, "everyone knows that learning stuff is for losers. You're meeting us for lunch, right? Morgaine says she'll tell us all the dish from the meeting." Morgaine was Lisette's older sister. She had inherited her place on the board from their late grandfather.

"I'll be there even if Carly sets fire to the place," Christine promised.

Lisette wrinkled her nose, "Don't even go there or she probably will. She'll start lighting aromatherapy candles in the oxygen tents or something."

To say that Lisette and Carly did not get along was putting things mildly. If Lisette had her way, Carly would have been fired on her very first day. Granted, Carly had never been the ideal employee, but the girl had never had much of a chance. Lisette certainly hadn't made any effort towards training her and Christine didn't have a spare week to sit with Carly, walking her through her tasks. Christine had been clever enough to work around her early mistakes. Lisette was motivated enough to do three times more work than she needed to, in order to set things right when she made an oversight. Carly was neither clever nor driven but she could have done her job perfectly well, if someone had been willing to help her a little. Of course, there was no point in trying to fix it now, since the praise and promises from the directors of the opera had turned Carly into an insufferable monster.

Christine shifted the pile of reports from one arm to the other. Things had been so much easier when Lisette was Dr. Whittaker's administrative assistant. She and Christine had been close friends almost from the day they met, when Lisette had auditioned for the choir, back when Christine was the one answering the phone.

Lisette hadn't been raised as one of the Good Folk, but not everyone was. She had moved to Santa Cecelia with Morgaine when their grandfather passed away. Unlike Christine and Carly, she hadn't been classically trained, but she had a degree in theater and had been singing since she was little. Outside of the opera house, the opportunities in Santa Cecelia were limited, but Lisette was determined to find whatever was out there. She called up churches, checked every community center bulletin board, sent a letter of introduction to the library arts program and followed up with any human being she could find who knew something, anything, about finding places to sing in Santa Cecelia. Her persistence had paid off when she happened to be picking up a copy of the free local arts newsletter in the same building where Christine's group happened to be rehearsing. Lisette had waited in the hall until a break, then boldly asked if she could audition for a place in the group. Fate was on her side, but then again, fate tended to be kind to the good folk. Sharon Sorelli had just been promoted out of the choir to be a soloist on the harp, and within four bars, Lisette had her old place.

There were Good Folk who didn't fit in. For example, Mr. Khan who so frightened Carly was probably one the folk, but he didn't exactly fit in with any group. He was far too gentle to be part of the Court of Leaves, much too reserved for the Court of Blossoms, and a little too, well, sane for lack of a better word for the Court of the Harvest. That left the Court of Thorns but they hadn't been seen or heard from on the west coast for years, so that was out. Mr. Khan didn't fit in, and being one of the folk and not fitting in was far worse than being an outsider entirely. Lisette fit in. She was Court of Blossoms through and through, as was Christine and every other member of their group.

Granted, Lisette was a musician and musicians tended to have an easier time being accepted than most. Some of the older folk said that all great musicians were Good Folk, whether or not they ever attended Goblin Market or learned one of the languages or associated themselves with any of the courts. Some things aren't chosen, they simply are. Lisette knew her parts almost as soon as they were handed to her and could harmonize with Christine and Sharon. Eventually, Christine suggested that, just as harp solo parts were added in for Sharon, vocal solos should be written in for Lisette. It was the fastest transition from newbie to principal soloist since the first principal soloist role had been dreamed up for Christine Daaé by O.G.

O.G., like Mr. Khan, didn't fit in, but it seemed to Christine that it was largely by choice. For one thing, O.G. would never reveal his name or any details about himself. He had found the Goblin Market somehow, but had no intention of introducing himself there or anywhere else. He didn't communicate by e-mail or phone, only via internet relay chat, where he was very much the "operaghost" his handle described. Christine's best guess was that he worked at the opera, since he'd found her online back when she had been the temporary receptionist for the managers' office with an IP that traced back to the opera house. O.G. was the opera ghost, after all, so why wouldn't he haunt someone who worked at the opera house?

"Four drummers is excessive," O.G. had typed, without any bother of introducing himself or asking how she was or saying hello. He had a point, to an extent. At the time, all four drummers played the same kind of handheld drums. Two of them were masters of their craft, and that was all to the good. The other two were students, and it showed. With all four playing together, the rhythms started to get a little muddied, as the students hit the beat before, after and around the right place while the eight person choir struggled to be heard at all.

"It's traditional music," Christine typed back, "that's how it's supposed to be."

"Messy," O.G. shot back, "is not what any music is 'supposed to be.'"

Under other circumstances, she would have freaked out and blocked O.G. or, if that didn't work, she'd have logged off permanently. However, he'd obvious heard her choir group at the Goblin Market which meant he was folk and hence she was willing to humor the madman. Secondly, she knew that, obnoxious as he was, he was also right. She knew that the drumming wasn't being used effectively, and the choir's balance wasn't quite right and their arrangements were pedestrian. She just didn't have the resources, the experience or the talent to do anything about it and O.G. did. Once you got around the atrocious lack of social skills, O.G. was probably the greatest musician she had ever not exactly met.

"You don't think he's some sort of crazy stalker, do you?" She asked Mrs. Valerius, who mothered both Christine and her father after Colleen Daaé was gone.

Mrs. Valerius shook her head, "With a talent like that? I'd sooner think he'd been sent by the angels than the devil." It was easy enough for her to say, since she believed in neither of the above, but Christine knew that she meant something else. Mrs. Valerius was thinking of the Fair Folk, who could do great good or great evil for no more than a whim. If you prayed to them, you were very careful of what you prayed for, just in case they decided to give it to you.

"Well, he isn't from our court, that's for damn sure," Christine had said, "and the Leaf Court would never go in for the anonymous thing. I could ask Meg if she knows anyone at the Harvest Court who fits the profile." Sensible, modern women protect themselves from potential serial killers on the internet. Sensible, modern women don't believe in Fair Folk either.

"Christine Daaé!" Mrs. Valerius bristled, "I cannot believe my own ears! To think I near raised you up by hand and here you are, talking like an outsider!" Mrs. Valerius wasn't speaking in English and the word for "outsider" was not a kind one. "You don't repay a gift with questions and spying."

Christine had considered saying that she could offer to mail O.G. some socks. Repaying a favor with socks was the worst insult you possibly give someone and there were times when O.G. richly deserved it. "Your voice doesn't blend into the choir. You are all wrong for it," he had said one day, which had so upset Christine that she'd logged off immediately, the tears already welling up. She knew that he was right, but her efforts to fix the problem had failed thus far and she lived in terror of being thrown out and left with nowhere at all to sing. It wasn't as if the Santa Cecelia Opera was calling, or even accepting her resume, for that matter.

The song, her song, had been a wordless peace offering from O.G. He transferred the file and disappeared, prompting her to ask for advice from Mrs. Valerius. O.G. knew her somewhat better than she thought he did. Mrs. Valerius advised her to accept the gift and make peace, as it were and so she did and for a time, O.G. became the most influential person in her life. Then he disappeared for good.

There had been no warning at all. One day, O.G. simply wasn't there and so it was all the days after that. There was no parting message, no way to know if he had died or lost interest or who knows what. At first, Christine was worried, and then she was hurt, and then she was angry and then she got on with her life. She filled up her time by volunteering to stuff envelopes to support local clean water legislation and had met Raoul de Chagny, a crusading Leaf Courtier if ever there was one, and moved forward. She left the opera for a better job at the hospital, studied law at the local state university thanks to a generous scholarship from the hospital board, was promoted and never really forgot O.G. "It's like there's a part of you that always far away," Raoul said, and perhaps he wasn't wrong. Christine paused, turning her thoughts back to matters at hand.

She walked into the boardroom, looking calm and cool, as if the last few hours had been spent relaxing by a pool rather than covering her hands with paper cuts as she rushed to get pages into plastic covers. The boardroom was clean, the coffee was already set out, the pastries looked entirely edible and the fruit salad was fresh. When Mr. Khan appeared, tall and gaunt like something from a fairy tale, Christine smiled and offered her hand. "It's so good to see you again, Mr. Khan."


	4. Not Counted Fair

Before the sunrise on another blistering summer day, Mrs. Giry left her little cottage that she had once shared with her little daughter, now far away. She used a little key that she carried on a little chain around her neck to open a little door in the hedge that separated her little home from the land surrounding the palace by the sea.

She moved swiftly and surely, a compact little figure all in black, effortlessly avoiding every thorn and briar. Only she knew the secret way to come and go, so that the hedge would neither tear her clothes nor scratch her skin. How many times had she caught little Meg, with rents in her dresses or marks on her arms from trying the little door, dear little Meg who had not come home for so many years. Mrs. Giry hesitated in the doorway, but the thought of her child steeled her nerves.

He would be asleep now, in his dark bedroom with the curtains fastened down to block out every sliver of light. Was he dreaming of Christine Daaé, lying still, wrapped up in pleasures that the waking world had denied him? Or perhaps he was lost in a nightmare, clawing his way back to the safety of the day. Or maybe he was with her, the cruel queen of faerie- her prisoner, her lover and her accomplice. Who could say? Suffice it to know that he was locked away in slumber, for the time being.

It was early, even for Mrs. Giry who came every morning with the dawn and left after the sun went down. The palace by the sea was quite long way from her little home, but she always walked. It was better to walk and keep one's dignity than to be like the silly Persian, teetering on his bicycle and looking the fool. She liked the walk because it gave her time to herself, time to think about dear little Meg, so far away. Poor little Meg, all alone in a far away city, struggling after a dream her mother could fulfill quite easily, if only Meg would let her. It was the least she could do, for her child.

The gnarled limbs of old trees reach across the path, but Mrs. Giry evades them with no trouble. She knows every last branch and has walked this way many times, always alone. It gives her time to think. Sometimes she thinks about her daughter. More often, she thinks about him. He slips unbidden into her mind and taints her thoughts.

Every morning, she prints the day's menu. E-mail is too familiar. It invites comments and confidences. The printed sheet is left on the desk in his office. He may send it back down without a mark on it, or he may draw slashes through every single item. He uses red ink. No one grudges rich men their peculiarities. On rare occasions, he writes in his preference, in thin, spidery letters that have an awkward grace.

The kitchen is silent and empty when Mrs. Giry arrives at the great house, the palace by the sea. This is her domain, and even he doesn't intrude. If he wants something in the night, he'll send one of the staff down for it. The lights flicker on, one at a time, triggered by her movement. When she is alone, sometimes she walks through the room, waving one arm in the arm in the air, so that the lights won't go out. There's something threatening about the dark in this house. Even he was once afraid of the dark, and Mrs. Giry knows the reason why. It's better not to think of those things, to think about the Faerie Queen is to give her more power. Instead, Mrs. Giry seats herself and begins to attend to the business of the day.

It's a little before seven and he is waking. She can always tell. The atmosphere turns a little bit colder and Mrs. Giry shivers. His apartment includes a bathroom, all in marble, with a sunken tub and a shower large enough to be the modern equivalent of the Roman baths. When he emerges, smelling faintly of soap that is hand-milled in France for the Van Der Luydens alone, he goes into his closet, the size of a dressing room to choose one of many near identical suits purchased from a firm in Europe that is so exclusive they don't bother with a label. Once every six months or so, a man flies out to take his measurements, just in case they have changed. His shirts are sent from London four times a year. He has never been particularly interested in shopping, not even when he would leave the house more often.

There was a time, when he was not more than a year or two past twenty, when he took it into his head to travel. A private plane was arranged and he flew away to some watering hole where the rich go to relax in their wealth. Everyone assumed that he'd come back with a woman. Certainly, the thought was in his head, that much was clear. A month later, he returned alone, looking a little weary and sounding hollow. He never talked about it.

Perhaps he did have women then, Mrs. Giry thought to herself, punctuating her discomfort with the tapping of the keys as she types. He had amused himself among the bleached, tanned, hard-limbed women whose eyes search out a man's income in the cut of his suit. Mrs. Giry can almost imagine sun-browned fingers running across his cold, white skin. There is something both enticing and repellent about that pale, dead flesh. If a woman preferred the sparkle of diamonds to the light of the sun, there would be little trouble. Women like that are easily bought. She sees manicured fingers and painted lips, but he closes his eyes and turns away, in his face a little death.

Mrs. Giry shakes her head. She doesn't like to think of him as a lover. She knows that he has succumbed to the Faerie Queen, in the night, in the dark. He fought for a long time, but his strength failed him at last. She is quite sure of it. She can sense it, but that is her gift.

Among her own people, Mrs. Giry is known as a Raven: sharp-eyed, bright-witted, clever and perceptive. Her place is to see things that other do not or cannot see and to know things that other cannot or would rather not know. Her talents are greatly valued by the Harvest Court and her influence extends to the highest and most respected of their leaders. For the sake of the Good Folk and the Harvest Court, she watches Mr. Van Der Luyden, careful to make certain that he does not learn what she knows. For the sake of Mr. Van Der Luyden, for the sake of the child he once was, or whatever shred of brightness might still flicker in him, she has never betrayed him to her court. She only watches him and waits.

At home, alone in her little cottage, Mrs. Giry has been reading the signs. She can hardly help but read the signs since her sharp eyes can see that there are signs in everything. She sees the future in a hand of solitaire and a cup of tea. She sees portents in the flicker of candles and the changes in the weather. It's all there for her to see, laid out plain as day. She can see that something is going to happen but does not yet know what it will be. This year, the Goblin Market will last for one night only. That alone promises an eventful year, and if the year is to be eventful, even dangerous, then she must have her darling Little Meg back home.

Little Meg Giry lives in New York now- far from her home, far from her family, far from her folk. She is determined to succeed on her own, sensing that her mother aches to help her but refusing the favor. Little Meg knows better than to accept a favor from a Harvest Courtier, even if it is very own mother who loves her above all other loves. Mrs. Giry hears whispers here and there. Little Meg was singing the role of a gypsy woman. Little Meg is living with a leather-jacket-wearing temptress named Jennifer. Little Meg is breaking her little heart far away. Little Meg found out that she is an alternate for the Resident Artist Program at the Santa Cecelia Opera. Well, Little Meg must not be an alternate. There must be a place for her. They must make another place for her. Mrs. Giry knows who can make that happen. He's upstairs right this moment, sitting at the piano, pouring his bitterness into one of Rachmaninoff's preludes.

By nine o'clock, he is in his office, sitting in the shadows as he always does. It may be a trick of the darkness, but he looks restless, almost unwell. The skin around his eyes is discolored, as if he has not slept, or has been weeping yet he no longer weeps so that cannot be. He is both present and quite far away and Mrs. Giry believes that she can see his thoughts, flashing somewhere behind his cold, blue eyes. He knows what she is going to ask, and he is thinking. He is plotting something and working out precisely how this will affect his plans. Nevertheless, Mrs. Giry does ask for her favor, knowing that it will put her in his debt. It is worth it for the sake of her poor Little Meg, her beloved child.

Mrs. Giry is very careful not to say too much. He doesn't need to hear it and he certainly won't ever ask. Besides, she cannot quite bring herself to explain how she has quarreled with her dear Little Meg. She would rather not speak of letters unanswered and calls unreturned and hearts broken. What can he know of a little apartment with cracked linoleum on the floors and heating that never seems to work quite the way it should. These matters cannot interest him. It's always better to speak plainly with his kind. Little Meg must be given a place at the Santa Cecelia Opera and that is all there is to it.

"Of course," he says. His voice is quiet and low, as if he knows that people will listen carefully for any word he speaks. There is something intimate in that tone. It draws people in and makes them forget. Then he looks down at the papers on his desk. This is his way of indicating that the conversation is over. He is scowling today, his mouth twisted into an expression that could make anyone unattractive, whatever charms they might possess. His black hair falls across his face, but he takes no notice of it. He has no reason to be bothered, since he sees no one.

Mrs. Giry slips away in silence, knowing that he will likely call the Persian as soon as she is out of the room. No, he won't call, he'll send a message on the phone of his. He has become a great one for texting. The Persian will receive the message and he'll make the calls needed. When it is done, he will send a word or two back and the matter will be concluded to everyone's satisfaction. In the early afternoon, the house phone is ringing.

"Ms. Marguerite Giry has accepted a place at the Santa Cecelia Opera," says the Persian before he rings off. The Persian is always so dignified. Everyone here is dignified.

In the evening, Mrs. Giry sits alone in her cottage, waiting for the call from her sweet child, which will surely come soon. The wheels are in motion. Things have begun to happen. She can smell it on the air, like new rain. Why hasn't Little Meg called? The Persian said she had accepted her place at the opera, so why hasn't she called? Surely, there was no catch to her request!

Afraid to move too far away from the telephone, lest she miss her daughter's call, Mrs. Giry's thoughts drift back to the conversation with her employer. With a start, she realizes that Mr. Van Der Luyden didn't speak to her in English. He spoke in the language of the Good Folk, a language she knows so well that she doesn't think twice when she hears it. She is sure that she can remember his voice, speaking the words, carefully pronouncing them with scrupulous accuracy. Something has been set into motion, but what?

At last Mrs. Giry lies in bed, sleeping fitfully. Little Meg never calls.


	5. The Wind and Rain

When the Good Folk set things in motion, they moved with great speed and upset the usual order of things. Thus, Meg Giry, the constant outsider found herself on the inside of things and Nadir Khan, long accustomed to knowing and keeping secrets, was left outside.

The night before her flight left for Santa Cecelia, Meg Giry quarreled with Jennifer, the self-same Jennifer who wore a leather jacket, with whom she shared an apartment. Between them, they said things that neither could take back and both knew that only time would heal the rift between them, although neither was prepared to admit it. Meg gathered up as many of her possessions as she could carry and stormed out of the building. As she waited in the airport, attracting some interesting looks from security, she couldn't even remember what she and Jennifer had fought about but it didn't matter. She was moving on to Santa Cecelia and a brand new life without Jennifer in it. Meg Giry began to cry.

Meanwhile, in Santa Cecelia, Nadir Khan slept quite peacefully, unaware that he would wake to what seemed, at the time, like the worst news possible. Overnight, the great crystal chandelier in the newly built Santa Cecelia Opera House had somehow fallen. It was incomprehensible. No one had been in the building at the time. The building had been designed to withstand an earthquake. And yet, there was the chandelier in pieces, shards of crystal embedded in the walls as if the thing had exploded. Well, it had, in point of fact, burned, despite the fact that the power had been shut off at the time. It was some kind of mistake in the wiring, or so they said. Well, for whatever the reason, there was no possible way for the rehearsals to begin and it would be another three months before the opera house would be repaired and ready to mount a production. Nadir Khan laid his head in his hands and, had he been the sort of man who weeps, he would have.

The last thing Meg Giry needed was time to herself, but upon arriving in Santa Cecelia, she discovered that she had it in abundance. Her contract with the opera was being extended by several months to cover the delay caused by the chandelier disaster. Well, it was inconvenient, but at least no one was hurt. In the meantime, she would be provided with a studio apartment as promised in her contract and a stipend on which she could live decently, if not extravagantly. Within twenty-four hours, Meg felt she had exhausted the infinite possibilities of the entire internet which meant she had little to do but reflect on how miserable she felt. Bitterly, she thought that she could always going running back to mother, but of course, she would do no such thing. On the other hand, it wouldn't hurt to connect up with the Good Folk again, so she began searching for them.

There was never any official word about the Goblin Market, but the Good Folk never had any trouble finding it. In the old days, the information had been passed around by word of mouth from one person to another. In the internet age, much of that was handled though e-mail lists and websites. Needless to say, finding the Good Folk wasn't as simple as typing "Goblin Market" into a search engine. You had to know the languages the Good Folk knew, and then you had to figure out the right words. For Meg, it took no more than one try.

Had Nadir Khan gone searching for the Good Folk online, he never would have found them. In fact, he hadn't gone searching online, he'd gone searching through Mr. Van Der Luyden's e-mail account. It wasn't entirely wrong, because he'd stumbled across the information in the course of locating information his employer had requested. Still once one knows a thing, one cannot un-know it. Well, it was a public mailing list after all. Nadir had joined it under his hospital board address, which routed to his usual address. He wasn't technically hiding. If list members happened to be concealed unless they actually posted, that was no fault of his. Lots of people read without ever posting to the list. Mr. Van der Luyden didn't post either, and Nadir had no idea which one of his employer's many e-mail aliases was the one he'd used to subscribe. Unfortunately, however, it was all moot because the messages were always written in a language Nadir couldn't understand. The best he could do was to keep an eye out for dates and locations, when he had the time. For the time being, Nadir left the messages unopened. He had more than enough to deal with at the opera house.

With considerable amusement, Meg Giry watched her mother, for lack of a better word, flail. For the first time in more years than anyone could remember, the forecast was predicting rain on the night of the Goblin Market. This year, Samhain fell on a Saturday, which meant that the market would last for only one night. Rather than ending at midnight, it would be held over until morning, otherwise there would be hardly any time at all for anything. That wasn't a problem under normal circumstances, but these weren't normal circumstances. The weather report didn't merely say that it would rain. Rain didn't mean much to the Good Folk. They'd just carry on with business because it wasn't as if the rain would melt them. The trouble was, the weather report was promising a huge storm with torrential rain, and that was going to be a problem. It was going to be a big problem. The Harvest-Santa-Cecelia list was going absolutely wild over with hundreds of e-mails being passed back and forth in the hopes of finding someone who could provide some form of shelter. "Oh come now, mother," Meg said to the screen, "you know you can take care of this easily enough. All you have to do is ask your boss and he'll let you have your tent and whatever else you need. How hard can it be? Just admit that all your talk about sticking with your own court and not trusting outsiders has been nothing but a great big sham because you're more attached to a bunch of outsiders than you are to your own daughter, never mind your own court."

Shortly before on October 31st, Nadir went looking for Mr. Van Der Luyden, but he was nowhere to be found. Mr. Van Der Luyden had gone out. Outside, the wind was howling and the rain was pouring down. Surely Mr Van Der Luyden was mad enough to go out in weather like this? Apparently, Mr. Van Der Luyden was that mad. Nadir shuddered. On the positive side of things, there wasn't so much as a glimmer of sunlight, so his employer would return blistered and bleeding. On the negative side of things, if he was standing outside in the downpour, he was likely to make himself ill and that could be disastrous. Even a minor cold would send the entire household into a panic, lest it should somehow set off an attack. It was much too late to follow Mr. Van Der Luyden, so Nadir would have to find him. After his initial panic subsided, Nadir turned to his e-mail inbox. Even if all of those messages were written in gibberish, he might still be able to discern a location out of it all.

It had been amusing the think of how her mother must have squirmed when the call for help went out over the general e-mail list. They even wrote in English, which was a sure sign of desperation. It really wasn't all that difficult to read another court's dialect, heck, reading it was much easier than hearing it, but when you want to get the message out as quickly as possible, you write it in English. Technically, there was a common dialect in their own language, but English was still more convenient. Meg had found the messages to be quite entertaining, despite being less dramatic than she might have hoped. Between the Blossoms, who could throw a party anywhere for any reason, and the Leaves who had been holding rallies for every cause they could come up with, there were plenty of people who had access to tents. It was just a matter of deciding who would show up with what and getting a bunch of people to turn up early enough to get the whole thing set up. Granted, it wasn't exactly an ideal situation since there wasn't much available in the way of lighting and the ground squelched a good deal more than one might have liked, but it was still a Goblin Market. As always, Meg's mother was nicely settled with a few members of her own court towards the edge of the group, leaving Meg complete freedom to wander in the shadowed crowd with no fear of being seen or recognized.

Nadir Khan was very much relieved to find all the information he needed, even down to driving directions and suggestions about the best places to park, all laid out in perfectly comprehensible English. He quietly thanked whatever forces were responsible for the unexpected interlude of sense, not realizing that those selfsame forces were sending him out on his own in the middle of the worst storm he'd seen in years. He put the windshield wipers on their highest setting and put the headlights onto the bright setting as he'd turned and twisted his way through the hills. The directions were on the seat beside him, but he could barely see them, even when he picked them up and held them against the steering wheel. Luckily, he remembered most of the instructions. Unluckily, he had not remembered to bring an umbrella. Nadir resigned himself to bring drenched. Well, there were worse things and it wasn't as is a little bit of rain would melt him. If Mr. Van Der Luyden's driver was parked here, the man must be sleeping in the car. There was no light to be seen, but there was music and a sudden roar of cheering voices.

Meg had to give the Blossoms credit. They knew how to whip up a crowd. Instead of beginning with one of their usual opening selections, they picked a song about trading music for shelter from the bad weather. When they got to bit where the singer promises to keep on playing until morning, the crowd let out of whoop that probably could be heard as far away as the interstate. Those words weren't just lyrics, they were a promise. Of course, Meg could have gotten the same reaction if she were up there singing. She was a professional singer, after all. In fact, she probably could go up there and sing, if she really wanted to. She and Christine Daaé had been quite good friends, back in the day. They shared a bit of a bond, since they were both very much overshadowed and intimidated by their mothers. Granted, Christine's mother was long gone and Meg's was stubbornly present, but Colleen Daaé's reputation more than made up for her physical absence. It wouldn't hurt to say hello to Christine when she took a break. It was too bad, a bummer even, that Meg didn't know more traditional songs, because the more she listened, the more she wanted to join in.

Mr. Van Der Luyden was nowhere to be seen. Nadir Khan had circled the tent, well, technically tents, and found no sign of his employer. That didn't mean that Mr. Van Der Luyden wasn't there. Perhaps he was a little further off, among the trees. Nadir decided to look a little more. After all, he was already soaked to the skin, so it wasn't as if he could get any more wet. From time to time, he paused to listen to the music. He actually recognized an aria from one of Handel's operas and then a song from a Disney film. They were expanding their repertoire, apparently.

It had taken consider convincing, not just of Christine Daaé who was thrilled at the idea of having a break longer than two songs. The second soloist, Lisette, was not entirely sure she wanted to share the stage with yet another singer and Jack, who had the final say, was the hardest to convince. Still, if opera and pop music were fair game, then Meg would have no trouble fitting in, at least, she'd fit in musically. Even when Lisette joined in to plead for giving a Meg a chance, he was still hesitant. Meg needed a different dress, something that would cover up her tattoos, well, more of her tattoos, and she couldn't wear heavy clunky boots because they'd thump in the wrong way and she needed to brush out her hair. Well, Meg could live with that. She let Christine and Lisette fuss over her while she thought through the harmonies she would sing. That had been the hook, after all. Meg could come up with an alto line because two soloist singing in harmony was a duet, but three was a group.

Nadir Khan stood outside in the rain, quite transfixed. He had given up hope of ever finding his employer outside, but dared not go inside for fear of exposure. Still, he couldn't help but stop and listen for a while. Mr. Van Der Luyden understood music and although Nadir Khan could not say that that he understood what he was hearing, he knew that it was something quite magical.

Meg Giry had decided. She knew now what she intended to do with herself, at least until the opera season began. It would mean changing courts of course, but it could be done. Her mother would never forgive her, but her mother was already estranged and how much more estranged could she really get? Meg would have to learn how to pronounce things like a Blossom courtier, but if Lisette could learn the language from scratch then surely Meg could relearn it. When her contract at the opera began, well, she'd work that out when she came to it. Who was to say that more disasters wouldn't take place? Maybe the opera season would never get happen at all.

The opera season was going to happen, just not quite the way it had originally been planned. Mr. Van der Luyden had decided, quite unexpectedly, to make changes to the season beyond a mere postponement of the performances. Nadir Khan had even more to do now that before. He also had a dreadful cold.


End file.
